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Sunday, January 22, 2012

Irish Soda Bread - White



Irish Soda bread is a delicious bread very popular in Ireland. It is called this way because its leavening agent is the soda, which in conjunction with the buttermilk and the cream of tartar make the dough raise in the oven.
As the soda gets in contact with buttermilk it starts to react, so it is of vital importance to tray up as quick as possible the bread after mixing and put it straight away in the pre-heat oven. When cooked, the loaf will sound hollow when rapped on the bottom with your knuckle.

Irish flour and Irish buttermilk should be used for this recipe.
Irish flour is a very soft flour with a low gluten content. You can use in the recipe only cream flour (instead of a mix of cream and baker flour) if you wish. I personally recommend using odlums. The bread flour of this brand has a low gluten content.

If you don't live in Ireland any cake flour should do the job.

The buttermilk is kind of difficult to find outside Ireland, and even if you manage to do so, it could have a different degree of acidity than the one you can find in Ireland. For this very reason, you will need to change the proportion of cream tartar to suit the buttermilk that you have.




Ingredients

For 4 x 490gr each

Stage Ingredients Gr. Baker% Method
1 Cream Flour
Strong Flour
Salt
Cream of Tartar
Bread Soda
500
500
15
30
20
50%
50%
1.5%
3%
2%
Sieve flour and salt,
cream of tartar and bread
soda toghegher
2Butter80 8%Rub butter into Flour
3 Buttermilk
Caster Sugar
850
20
 85%
20%
Dissolve sugar in buttermilk,
add to dry ingredients and mix
gently
Total:2015 201.5% 



For 2 x 490gr each


Stage Ingredients Gr. Baker% Method
1 Cream Flour
Strong Flour
Salt
Cream of Tartar
Bread Soda
250
250
7
15
10
50%
50%
1.5%
3%
2%
Sieve flour and salt,
cream of tartar and bread
soda toghegher
2Butter40 8%Rub butter into Flour
3 Buttermilk
Caster Sugar
425
10
 85%
20%
Dissolve sugar in buttermilk,
add to dry ingredients and mix
gently
Total:1007 201.5% 


Processing Details


Details Temp/Time Instructions
Dough Temperature
Use cold buttermilk
Fermentation Timenone
Scaling Weight4904 (2) Pieces
Hand up into a roun ball shape
Intermediate Proofnone
ShapeHand up round (again)
Flat them out pushing the palm of your hand on top
Dust with flour
Cut cross in centre (deep cut with a big knife)
Sprikle with flour (or egg wash)

Proof Timnone
Baking temperature210 C
Baking time35 - 40 mins


Ingredients



Dry ingredients mixed and buttermilk

Mixing



Dough after mixing







Tray up




After Baking



Slice to show the texture

Sunday, January 15, 2012

Traditional Pan Bread - White

The first bread formula I am going to show you in my blog is the "Traditional Pan Bread -White". This is going to be a straight dough, i.e no pre-ferments, biga or poolish are used.
I would say that this is the perfect bread to make for any beginners, because its dough is very easy to knead.
Despite that, it certainly contains all the steps of the bread making process.







Ingredients

Ingredients for 5x500gr Loafs

Stage Ingredients Gr. Baker% Method
1 Baker Flour
Salt
1500
30
100%
2%
Sieve Salt with flour
2Butter302%Rub butter into Flour
3 Yeast (fresh)
Water
50
875
3.3%
58.3%
Disperse Yeast in water or
rub it in to flour. Add liquid into
flour and mix to a dough



Ingredients for 3x500gr Loafs

Stage Ingredients Gr. Baker% Method
1 Baker Flour
Salt
900
18
100%
2%
Sieve Salt with flour
2Butter182%Rub butter into Flour
3 Yeast (fresh)
Water
30
525
3.3%
58.3%
Disperse Yeast in water or
rub it in to flour. Add liquid into
flour and mix to a dough

Processing Details


Details Temp/Time Instructions
Dough Temperature26 C
Fermentation Time60 minsKnock back after 45 minutes or Folding
Scaling Weight4905 (3) Pieces
Hand up into a roun ball shape
Intermediate Proof10 mins.Keep Covered
ShapeKnuckle out inot a pad
Fold in ends to form a rectangle
Roll up (Swiss roll fashion)
Place individual dough pieces prepared in a
baking tin / pan
Dress with sieved flour (or egg wash)
Proof Time45-50 minsCut a slit along top using a sharp blade - prior to baking
Either one centre or three oblique and parallel
Baking temperature210 C
Baking time30-35 mins


The final loafs were very nice but not perfect.



1) Baking pan. It was too large and shallow to bake 490gr of dough. But these are the ones that you can easily find in the baking shops here in Ireland. The ideal ones would be 12x8x9 (LxWxH)

2) Dusting with flour: I forgot to dust the loafs just before scoring

3) Scoring; Scored was not perfect: Should have been a bit shallower on the straight one

4) Baking: I should have baked them few minutes more

Here you can find images for the some of the steps.



Dough after mixing 2 minutes mixing with K-Beater


Dough after 3 minutes mixing with Dough hook. I also hand-kneaded the dough few minutes.



Hamelman Folding Technique (instead of simple knock bak)




Dough after primary fermentation


Scaling

Scaling (round ball)






Shaping


scoring